Sacked for being male and white

“Should I, as a white man (through no fault of my own), be fired from my job because I am a white man?” he asks. “Arguably, yes. You may well think I’m crap on The Now Show, and that’s fine, but to be told it’s because I’m the wrong sex and colour? I’m just not sure that’s helpful to anyone’s cause. If we are now openly giving jobs to people based on the colour of their skin, surely that is only emphasising just the kind of social division that the equality that I was brought up to embrace strives to eliminate?” he writes.

“So what if – and I know this is radical – but what if everything and every job in all walks of life was open to everyone equally, and we all just agree that everyone’s the same, by which I mean – you know – ‘human’?”

The BBC are not completely agreeing with his version of events. A BBC spokesman said: “While the government’s new charter for the BBC does set us diversity targets, we always hire presenters on merit. We’d like to thank Jon Holmes for his contribution but our comedy shows are constantly evolving and it was simply time to create opportunities for new regulars when The Now Show returns this autumn. Jon’s contract was lapsed and wasn’t renewed and this was a creative not a diversity decision.”

Should some areas of public life such as the media, the police, the NHS and education, have positive discrimination where racial groups or genders which are not fairly represented with an open employment policy, can get a leg up and extra support to succeed in getting a job? Or should it be completely equal chances for all?